My 2016 Journey to a $2,000 Month

Hello! I am not very skilled at much when it comes to internet marketing, or many of the things that are done here on BHW. SEO? Not a clue. What I have, though, is some time and a lot of motivation to make more than just my day job (Audio/Video/Control Systems Design Engineer). Last year I set out on a journey to make $50/day using a combination of a few sources (found on this thread here). Most of those sources fizzled with the exception of Redbubble. 12 Months into that project and I have not come close to the $50/day mark... But at the same time, I never expected to - I always set my goals high. The ending total was $2,882.90 for the 12 months. That's an average of $240/month, or $7.80/day.

A couple of factors to consider when looking at that - my first December was only $38.15 and my second December was $529.00, so the growth there is obvious. Also, the investment made in this entire project has fallen under $200. A Wordpress .com (GoDaddy), a few proxies, TumblingJazz, a subscription to Picloadr, and a handful of Fiverr Designs. I have only relied on traffic from Tumblr to my Website to the products to kick start my designs on Redbubble, but once they get a few sales they rank high enough that they then get most sales from naturally ranking on the RB website, and that's when the real money comes in from any particular design. Because of this, when paired with TumblingJazz... This has been a very passive project. A new market only takes about 1-2 hours total, while new designs are easily done in about 30 minutes start to finish.

So why start something new and not just expand this project?

Diversitry, and also ideas and inspiration. With this sort of project, it takes being creative in a load of different places. Each market or niche I try to have 3 but no more than 5 designs, and then I want to expand into other markets. I feel like each market is relatively capped, and there is a better chance for having higher numbers hitting a multitude of markets. But that isn't easy. I have about 60 designs currently, and only a couple of them are really hitting hard, but the others do turn a profit just not as often. I've also run into products getting pulled despite having no copyright infringement, after battling Redbubble on the issue they've admitted "Even if it's not breaking any copyright, we're not going to fight the larger copyright owner who complained, so it's staying down" and if you get enough of those complaints they shut your store down, albeit temporary while they "clean things up." So while I do plan on expanding on this project, I also want to make sure that I keep trying new things. This was not my first idea that I've tried, and it shouldn't be my last. No idea, no matter how good, should be the last one you try - certainly not since it is running passively, and can be expanded at anytime inspiration strikes.So what is the plan?

I have no idea, yet. But I am working on it, and reading the journeys of others and trying to find the thing that I feel most comfortable with. I have recently started a side job which makes about $80-$100/week from home with only a few hours of work. This money, while not breaking any banks, is the sort of extra invest-able income that I think I would need to begin a new project while also expanding on my previous. Currently it is going to Christmas gifts, and some bills that have piled up, but 2016 that will not be an issue and I feel comfortable with the concept of some trial and error investing, as long as at the end of the day I have invested wisely and can realize a good return on investment. I recognize that the 1,400% ROI that 2015 brought me is not a realistic number when talking about investing (if only it were that easy) but knowing where to put my first $1,000 will go a long way in making sure that it meant more to do that than to just stash it in savings.
What have I tried?

Not much effectively, unfortunately. I had purchased an Amazon Affiliate store site from Luhasr, but after my first sale Amazon reviewed the site and decided it did not have enough content and rejected my Amazon Affiliate account (which I had been setup previously just fine). I have tried MNS with Adsense, but that was miserable because I just don't have the right knowledge when it comes to SEO and ranking websites.

I have tried doing a few of the other methods described by others in the forum, but alone I just haven't had the ability to make much headway with the skill sets that I lack. I imagine a lot of this journey will require investments, in terms of services purchased or other things being designed or setup by others. I can be comfortable with that, as long as I can see the benefit of it in the end.

So why have a thread, if you don't even know what you're doing yet?

Because I believe that this will help me gather my ideas. I look at everyone's goals on BHW and I feel as if my 2015 $7.80/day is overshadowed and laughable... But I also see a lot of people try and fail and never make anything... So I believe I have been "successful" thus far in simply trying and making a profit.

I would love input, feedback, etc from the group of people out there. This has been a great place to learn, but sometimes it's hard to see what is actually working and who is just trying to sell something (because face it... we're all selling something.) I want this thread to exist, like my last one, for the people out there who want to try something, who may not be as skilled as others, who may not have much or anything to start with, or who may be trying something similar and can think of a new tweak because of my journey.

And it will keep me focused, even before the idea has come to life.What am I thinking is next?

I wanted to look into the possibility of some SEO and ranking on my current website. While all it is doing is linking to my Redbubble page (So each page is simply a photo of an example of the product that links through) and seeing if I can get some more natural business through another stream.

I has always been curious about getting a product manufactured, and providing it to Amazon through the Fulfilled by Amazon service. I read an interesting journey (or it could have been a podcast) about getting a product manufactured and shipped to Amazon's warehouse. And then from there it was all up to creating an audience and a demand through social media and offline marketing. I've found this fascinating, because depending on the market, it could also become a passive type project - similar to my Redbubble, I find myself wondering if I could make a more generally useful item with a broader audience that I could push people through to. As discussed, this is a possible investment with possible rewards also being great.

Yes, last year may have had small returns compared to your goal, but you did turn a profit. That seems to be the hardest thing and is what I'm currently working on myself. It's good to know you've gained ground.

Yes, last year may have had small returns compared to your goal, but you did turn a profit. That seems to be the hardest thing and is what I'm currently working on myself. It's good to know you've gained ground.

I've been focusing on the holidays as of right now. I have continued allowing my blogs to grow and to push sales for the Redbubble business - total sales for the month of December have grown to $686.13 as of today. I'm still looking through journey threads and other making money posts to determine my next course of action and the expansion of business. I have not found the "perfect" method that I believe I can twist in the right way to meet my skills - but it is a work in progress for sure.

I have held off on expanding the design portfolio on Redbubble during the holiday season - sales are too good to risk losing the account for a week during a copyright review.

Happy New Year Everyone! Time to get to work!It has definitely been a slow start to the year, but I'm going to be ramping up soon! The year closed up with a $786.58 payment on Redbubble. Nice way to finish off! I know that was holiday surge, so I am not expecting a month like that for some time - but it's motivating. The money is there, and it's simply a matter of finding a way to go out and earn it! So I have been working on a few different things, trying to see what I am comfortable with and what I can expand on.

So far:

Redbubble $141.21
Where are we and what is next? I have slightly changed my strategy - the long and short? Tumblingjazz, scrape popular photos related to market, post 2-3 an hour with click through to my website market page and no description, reblog 1 related posts an hour, like 20 related posts per hour. Started this strategy with 3 blogs, and traffic has increased sixfold, and the clickthrough rate to my products is still around 10-15% a day. Not bad, considering. I'll be expanding on the lineup of items currently available, hopefully in a significant way. I have been thinking about testing out doing band lyric shirts. Simple to make, easy to knock out a few, and very targetable. This week I hope to make a few and pilot them with a couple of bands.

Popads $.15
Where are we and what is next? I'm not even sure if I'm using Popads correctly, honestly. The numbers for traffic don't really line up with anything that makes any sense, unless a lot of my traffic is using Adblock, but I believe most of my traffic is mobile. Either way, fifteen cents is fifteen cents more and it's not really hurting my numbers at all. (Why not Adsense? I messed up a long while back attempting some Black Hat things and lost Adsense in the process. I also don't actually have any content on my page, except some information regarding the niche and the product pages... could be why my Popads numbers suck so much)

Crakrevenue $0
Where are we and what is next? I only have 4 blogs firing off to a website that redirects to Crakrevenue. One of the only reasons I'm attempting this is because I had $12.50 left over from another journey, and I figured I may as well throw something at it. Only getting about 15 uniques a day to my Crak link, but it's only been a couple of days, and you can't make anything unless you try.

Instagram Shoutouts $0
This one is not expected to do anything for quite a while, but I don't mind the long game in the meantime. I've got Followliker running a single account for now - I want to make sure my settings are solid and that no hammer is coming after a couple of weeks, if everything checks out then I'm happy to expand to a few more accounts. Only 111 followers, so I know this one is a way off.
Amazon Associates $0
This one is not really expected to do anything either, as I've only got one product review up and I am doing a general targeting of the market with a single blog. The website itself is only getting a few hits a day, for now, but the thought was that it doesn't hurt to possible have someone snag up my cookie on their way around checking things out. I will expand on this one further later, as I believe I can send some decent targeted traffic to the page - but it's all a matter of getting a good website setup. The last Amazon page I have gotten did not go well, and I lost my Amazon account in the process after my first sale.

It's a lot of dishes I'm trying to cook, but I don't expect the world from all of them. I have one method, one source of income that I feel good about - but I want to diversify. I want to strengthen my portfolio and see what else I can make work with the methods that I'm using. At this point it's a race to see what starts to boil, and then I can focus more energy there.

I figure I could try to keep things a little up to date daily, as that is helpful for anyone who is trying to learn from my mistakes or do something surrounding what I'm doing. Not much going on, unfortunately, but I can give the updates.

Redbubble $160.17Not really much new. I made a new product in one of my more popular markets. No action on that yet, except about 30 views on it. We'll see how that pans out.Popads $.17It's actually rather funny to have around - one of the main reasons I'm keeping it. Any better options for popup/popunder ads for a media site?

Crakrevenue $0Lost one of my NSFW blogs to the hammer. It's my own fault - I took a completely new account and just started blasting links and photos out. Never really the best policy.

Instagram Shoutouts $0Slowly coming along. 142 Followers currently.
Amazon Associates $0A couple of hits on the website hosting the link, but no click through - I know this one was a longshot, only updating because... why not.

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